1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a liquid crystal display and a method of manufacturing the liquid crystal display. More particularly, the present invention relates to a transflective liquid crystal display having a single cell gap and a method of manufacturing the liquid crystal display.
2. Description of the Related Art
A liquid crystal display (“LCD”) typically includes a liquid crystal layer disposed between two transparent substrates. To display a desired image, the LCD drives the liquid crystal layer to control a transmittance of light for each pixel.
In general, an LCD is classified as either a transmissive LCD, which displays an image using a backlight unit as a light source thereof, or a reflective LCD, which displays an image using natural light as a light source thereof, e.g., without requiring a backlight unit.
Compared to the reflective LCD, the transmissive LCD, which requires the backlight unit, has a high power consumption. Although it does not require a backlight, and thus consumes less power, the reflective LCD cannot display an image if there is insufficient ambient light.
In attempts to overcome the abovementioned problems with transmissive and reflective LCDs, a transflective LCD, which has both a reflective area and a transmissive area, has recently been suggested. Since the transflective LCD operates in both reflective and transmissive modes, depending on the environment or surroundings of the LCD, the transflective LCD has relatively low power consumption, and is also able to be used in places with low ambient light.
However, the transflective LCD typically has a single cell gap structure and, as a result, a gray-scale difference occurs in the reflective and transmissive areas due to a phase retardation difference therein, thereby causing deterioration of display quality of the LCD. In contrast, when the transflective LCD has a dual cell gap structure, in which a cell gap of the transmissive area is larger than a cell gap of the reflective area, a step difference occurs between the reflective and transmissive areas. As a result, it is difficult to control a liquid crystal director, due to the step difference, and defects in patterning occur in a manufacturing process, thereby causing deterioration of both the display quality and production efficiency of the LCD.
Accordingly, it is desired to develop a transflective LCD that overcomes at least the problems discussed above.